Columbia 28 Specifications

Manufactured by:

Columbia Yacht Corporation

275 McCormick Avenue, Costa Mesa, California 92626 (714) 540-7070

2400 Wesley Street, Portsmouth, VA 23707 (703) 393-1051

The Bill Crealock designed C-28 was a departure from the early C-24,
C-26, and C-29 designs. The boxy cabin and ports were traded for the
"bullet shaped" main windows and the bump in the main cabin roof. But
the big difference was below the waterline. The C-28 was a skeg on skeg
design and one of the first fin keel Columbias.

According to John Broughton, the list kept by the Columbia sales dept.
shows that 553 C-28's were built from 1967 to 1975. There is no mention
of any change from a C-28 to a C-28 MkII is indicated on the sheet.

One detail I've been trying to nail down is interior construction. My '64
C-24 is a fiberglass shell with an all-wooden interior as is a '64 C-24
Challenger. I had thought that Columbia switched to interiors that were
mostly fiberglass in '65 or '66, but an early C-28 (hull #8) is reported
to be: ...all wood all over. It's painted over, but there is no
fiberglass except the hull and exterior decks, soles and cockpit.
Later C-28s had fiberglass interiors.

What's the difference between a C-28 and a C-28 MkII?
According to Dick Valdes, Columbia experimented with the bolt-on keel using different keel
shapes and weights. The keel was reshaped from an upside-down "t-shape" (the standard C-28) to a "V"
shape (the MKII). That is the defining difference. From other comments regarding building costs I would be
willing to bet it was also a less expensive manufacturing process.
The true MKII also had a taller mast but there are some MKII hulls with a short version mast.

Like most Columbias (and any older boat) you need to check for rotted
bulkheads from leaks at the chainplates, soft spots in the deck -
especially where bolts or other hardware go through the fiberglass and
into the wood core.

One C-28 Mk II owner and his surveyor found "substantial wet rot"
in the mast compression post located between the keelson and the
interior floorboards. He had to replace it. He advises all C-28
owners to inspect closely, as the post sits in the bilge, and may be
wet most of the time.

Like many older fin keel boats, some C-28 owners have had to replace
corroded keel bolts. Here is some info on the bolts for this boat from
a manual dated January 1972.

There are seven keel bolts. These are lag bolts installed from the
top. (3/4" DIA X 9" LG LAG STUD. DRILL .656" DIA X 5" DEEP USING C-28
KEEL ATTACHMENT JIG FOR POSITIONING HOLES. USE LAG END OF STUD AS TAP
TO THREAD KEEL. APPLY KEROSENE TO HOLE AND STUD DURING TAPPING
OPERATION. USE CAM-TYPE STUD DRIVER. LEAVE 4" MIN. OF STUD PROTRUDING
FROM TOP OF KEEL. - 7 REQUIRED.)